This February in Las Vegas, tennis greats Andre Agassi and Steffi Graf will try to defend their Pickleball Slam championship against 2014 Wimbledon finalist Eugenie Bouchard and former U.S. Open champion Andy Roddick, with a $1 million prize pool at stake. On Sunday, February 16, Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino will host the Pickleball Slam 3. ESPN will broadcast the tournament.
After two previous tournaments were held at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Hollywood, Florida, this is the first time the event has been staged in Las Vegas. An event spokesman told Rob Schaefer of Sports Business Journal that the Vegas tournament is anticipated to hold about 6,750 attendees and may add more, compared to the Florida tournament’s 4,500 capacity.
In the 2023 edition of the $1 million match, Agassi and Graf, who have been married since 2001 and had won 42 Grand Slam titles between them, defeated Maria Sharapova and John McEnroe. Agassi, who will attend the event in his birthplace, is vying for a third consecutive championship after defeating Roddick in the first event and Graf in 2023. In an effort to unseat Agassi this winter, Roddick will return, and Bouchard will participate in her first Pickleball Slam. In the exhibition double match, Bouchard is the only professional pickleball player competing. In January, she continued to compete as a WTA player and made her debut on the PPA Tour.
With a high viewership of 800,000, the 2023 Pickleball Slam broke the record for the most watched pickleball telecast on ESPN. According to Jon Lafayette of Broadcasting+Cable, the second edition of the tournament surpassed that number with a peak viewership of 990,000.
